Materials Services Division Managers' Meeting Minutes for January 20, 2005

January 20, 2005 

8:00 a.m. 

RJN-Director’s Conference Room, 3rd Floor 

Attendees: Janet Brooks-Chair, Karen Marriott, Heidi Johnson-Absent, Pauline Rodriguez, Pamela Kosted 

Guests: Dana Morrow

Cataloging Update – Pauline 

• Margaret Angeles returned from her maternity leave on January 17; Laqueta Lewis began working reduced hours due to the beginning of the school semester on January 10; and Beth Jones, OU SLIS student, began her internship in Cataloging on January 3. 
• Pauline met with Karen and Jim Welch on December 28 to discuss the idea of creating genre location codes for music CDs.  Jim sent her a copy of BE’s CD inventory, so that she can get an idea of how many CDs might need to be relabeled.  Pauline met with the Cataloging Technicians on January 11 to get their input.  The project is ongoing. 
• Pauline, Crystal, Clyde, and Beth attended an OLA TSRT meeting on January 10. 
• Pauline met with Jana, Crystal, and Clyde on January 14 to discuss the OLA program that the three are presenting.  Their topic will be problems encountered when cataloging locally published and/or produced materials. 
• Pauline recorded a book talk for Read About It on January 19. 
• Jana attended the Lunch and Learn workshop “The Abilene Paradox” on January 19. 
• All staff who wanted to attended one of the meetings discussing the pension plan opinion poll.  All staff completed the poll. 
• Using the cleaning cards in the thermal barcode printers seems to have reduced the number of problems with the printers.  y Jim Welch installed Connexion version 1.20 on Pauline’s PC on December 20, and is scheduled to install it on all catalogers’ PCs. 
• Due to staff shortages in Tech Processing and scheduled vacations in Cataloging, Laqueta worked extra hours during the month of December.  She assisted with processing of new materials and ordering barcodes. 
• Due to the workload and unexpected staff shortages in Tech Processing, Margaret has agreed to work extra hours January 20-29.  She will help process new materials. 
• Amigos plans to offer training in the new ILL system at the DN library on March 8.  Pauline will arrange enrollment for those who wish to attend. 
• The shared shredder ordered by Cataloging and Tech has arrived and been set up. 

Technical Processing Update – Heidi 

• The runs have been on average 757 labels per day.  TP currently receives an average of bout 48 boxes of materials a day.  
• Once again, Technical Processing is short staffed.  One processor is on bereavement leave, another one is sick.  Heidi has been helping with processing materials and would like to commend the remaining staff who have been working especially hard to keep materials flowing through the dept. 
• Kim Macarty has started as TP"s new processor on Jan. 3, 2005.  She says she loves her work and likes to keep busy which everyone assured her will not be a problem in TP. 
• Due to the heavy workload and the staffing situation in TP, none of the staff have attended any workshops or other extracurricular activities. 
• The new shredder has finally been received and set up for use in TP.   
• TP will have a new volunteer starting on Jan. 24, 2005.  Her name is Kim and she will be working every other Monday in TP; alternate Mondays she will work in the Business Office.  She should be available for volunteer work for at least the next 6 months. 
• Heidi, Christy, and Karen have met with Jim Welch in IT for a demonstration of TP's new GUI on January 13, 2005, after a week's postponement due to icy weather.  Jimmy has done a great job of simplifying the receiving function, and is currently fine tuning some areas after input from TP staff.  Another meeting will be scheduled once Jimmy has implemented some suggested enhancements. 
• All TP staff have filled out the retirement survey on the Intranet by the given deadline. 

Interlibrary Loan Update – Pamela 

• ILL continues to receive about 2000 requests per month, both requests for our material to be sent to other libraries and from our customers requesting titles we do not own. 
• Customers are pleased with the lower turn around time. 
• Amigos training will be offered on March 8th Christina will attend this session.  Pamela is hoping the training helps all to have a smooth transition to the new software. 

Materials Selection Update – Janet 

• Library Visits 
• During December selectors made an annual visit to VI and 6-month collection reviews to CH and DC. 
• During January selectors are making annual visits to ED and RE. 
• In February annual visits to DN and SO will be conducted. 
• Spotlight On…Black History month  
• The updated bibliographies have been forwarded to Planning and should be up on the Intranet Feb. 1st.   
• Selectors will update the Spotlight On…Asian American Month in March. 
• Collection Analysis 
• Kim has received the collection analysis reports from Automation.  She has formatted the major portion of the analysis and has it ready on the share drive for selectors use.  She is working on the AV analysis and the Withdrawn analysis now. 
• Meetings and Workshops attended: 
• Ruby, Susan and Marilyn attended part of the Adult Programmers’ Retreat on January 12th. Julie attended the YA programmers meeting on January 19.  Janet and Julie will attend the Children’s Programmers’ Retreat on February 9th. 
• Ruby, Julie and Janet attended the Lunch and Learn series “We’re on the Same Team, Remember”.  It was originally scheduled for January 5th, but was postponed to January 13th due to ice. 
• Janet met with Karen Bays and Ann Alliotta to discuss some intellectual freedom issues.  Janet will attend ED’s quarterly staff meeting on Saturday evening to discuss Intellectual Freedom issues and to review policy and procedures concerning customer comments. 
• Ruby and Julie are taping another round of Read About It segments on January 26th. 
• Janet and Selectors will meet with the Quality Book rep and one of the company VPs on January 27th.  Quality Books distributes a number of small press titles.   
• Janet shared quarterly statistical information from her department. Outreach Update-Dana 
• Dana shared some of the activities Outreach and Programming are involved in.  
• Dana is applying for a $24,000 grant to help with the Read to Me packets. 
• Programming staff are busy with summer reading plans and the retreats. 

Administration Update – Karen 

• Commission Meeting 
• Packets have been distributed.  Karen highlighted some information from the packet including the wireless networking project. 
• AdTeam 
• Training Needs Assessment-results are on the Intranet. 
• Karen reminded managers that the purpose of the assessment was to set levels for hiring new staff and to help plan training. 
• RFP/Invoice Approval 
• Lloyd/BO has requested a list of people who are authorized to approve RFPs or invoices to be paid.  Managers should send their list to Karen and indicate if there are any restrictions staff have for approving invoices. 
• Annual Report 
• The Annual report is at the printers.  Copies will be made available to Commission.  Hardcopy will come to departments soon. 
• Employee Loyalty Oath 
• The library attorney has looked at the question of the employee loyalty oath.  Ric and the administration are looking at how this should be handled. 
• Library Tip Sheet 
• Endowment developed a fact/tip sheet about the library including statistics, programs, collection, etc.  It will be expanded some to use for tours and other general use by library staff. 
• Budget 
• Karen announced that the budget will be locked at the system level on April 4th.  Managers should have their budget requests input a week before April 4th.  Karen will send out a copy of the budget timeline. 
• Managers need to look at part time hours, equipment needs, etc.  
• Karen does not have any information about NW yet, but managers need to start planning for this collection. 
• Karen has sent out budget information to library managers.  Their information is due back to her by mid February.  Continuation and Periodical information is due back to Susan at the end of February. AVL Balances 
• Karen recommended managers inform their staff that they need to get annual leave scheduled early for the year.  Leave can be denied if it causes a hardship for the rest of the office. 
• Appraisals 
• Karen asked the managers to be sure to include clear statements as to why an employee received a “4” rating on their appraisals.  Projects to receive a “4” should be clearly outside what they are normally expected to do. 
• Capitol Hill Project 
• Karen has spent a lot of time working on the Capitol Hill Project.  She will meet with Pauline and Heidi to go over some of the information. 
• Calendar Reminders 
• Pension Board meets January 25, 2005 at 3:30 at BI. 
• Library Managers Meeting January 26 at BI. 
• Children’s Services Retreat-February 9th DN 
• Xchange Meeting-February 21st, BI.  Karen reminded managers to send any agenda items for this meeting to Kay or to Karen. 
• Library Managers Retreat-Feb. 23rd-Java Dave’s.  The gang enforcement unit will be at this retreat.  All are welcome to attend this portion. 
• Booksale-February 25-27th. 

Tech Processing Problem File – Karen 

• Heidi has an Excel spreadsheet she keeps information about unusual processing or order information.  Jimmy is looking at a way to develop a searchable database for all to use.  Karen asked managers to review some of the categories in the spreadsheet and make some decisions that all can use for determining how to handle certain types of materials.  Also to look at other potential situations that decisions can be made early to help TP handle material. 

The next Materials Services Manager Meeting is scheduled for February 17th at the Capitol Hill Library.  Heidi Johnson will chair the meeting.